In this Cato Institute forum, CEI's William Yeatman discusses the inadequacies of FERC’s oversight of energy markets. Energy markets are too complex and evolving too fast to allow for effective federal oversight. Because regulation is impossible, an alternative is competitive discipline engendered by liberalized markets. And yet FERC has been moving in the opposite direction, in particular with the socialization of transmission costs. > View the discussion

AT&T agreed Sunday to purchase DirecTV for $67b in cash, stock, and acquired debt. If federal regulators approve the deal, the combined firm will serve nearly 26 million U.S. television subscribers—a figure dwarfed only by Comcast and Time Warner Cable, who also await the federal government’s permission to consummate their proposed merger.

The combined firm will be better positioned to bargain for lower programming costs, which in recent years have been the major driver of rising pay-television subscription fees. > Read more

CEI's Warren T. Brookes Journalism Fellowship is a one-year fellowship that aims to provide journalists the opportunity to improve their knowledge of free markets principles and limited government through interaction with CEI policy experts. > cei.org/warrenbrookes